Recommended Books for Adults Facing Divorce

Lois Gold, BETWEEN LOVE AND HATE: A GUIDE OF CIVILIZED DIVORCE. Plume Publishers, 1996.  ISBN 0452274966.

One of the least jargon-filled self-help books by a woman who was one of the presidents of the Academy of Family Mediators.

Abigail Trafford, CRAZY TIME: SURVIVING DIVORCE & BUILDING A NEW LIFE. Harper Perennial, 1993. ISBN 0060923091.

A step-by-step guide to understanding their predictable emotional passages of men and women after a marriage ends.  A journalist, Trafford shares experiences from her interviews of hundreds of divorced men and women. Trafford’s book is a classic, compassionate, articulate, and savvy.

Violet Woodhouse, et al., DIVORCE AND MONEY: HOW TO MAKE THE BEST FINANCIAL DECISIONS DURING DIVORCE. Nolo Press, 1998. 4th ed. ISBN 0873374622.

Pricey, but this book is packed with solid, practical, useful information to help you and your spouse wrestle with the tough financial decisions you’re having to make. Full of charts, formulas, fill-in-the blank formats to help you organize financial information.

E. Mavis Hetherington and John Kelly, FOR BETTER OR FOR WORSE. W. W. Norton, 2002. ISBN 0393048624.

Hetherington’s just-published book is the counter-point to Judy Wallerstein’s perspective on divorce.  Based on her nearly three decades of research, Hetherington notes that divorce’s “negative long-term effects have been exaggerated to the point where we now have created a self-fulfilling prophecy.” 

Gary J. Friedman, A GUIDE TO DIVORCE MEDIATION: HOW TO REACH A FAIR, LEGAL SETTLEMENT AT A FRACTION OF THE COST. Workman Publishing, 1993. ISBN 1563052458.

Written for divorcing couples, this book presents a truly inside view of the mediation process to help couples make the decision to mediate, to understand the ground rules and context, and to learn to select a good mediator.  Though the use of 12 case studies, the author leads the reader into many of the key issues that come up in the mediation process. Each case discussion includes the author’s running commentary from an open, revealing, and personal point of view.  This is the book I recommend if someone really wants to get the feel of what goes on in mediation!

Judith S. Wallerstein and Sandra Blakeslee, SECOND CHANCES: MEN, WOMEN AND CHILDREN A DECADE AFTER DIVORCE. Mariner Books, revised edition1996. ISBN 0395735335.

Based on a ten-year longitudinal study of divorce, this book is the first full account of the long-term effects of divorce on the American family.  Through the exploration of three detailed case studies, the divorce experiences of three very different families - with the complexities, tragedies, and opportunity inherent in divorce - are presented.  Clinical research data are present using a novelistic and anecdotal style. Though Wallerstein’s views have been criticized as biased towards high-conflict divorce and more pessimistic than the research data warrant, she is a good story-teller.

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